My Keeper
by dazedme2maker
Summary: They didn't have anywhere to put this unique story on this site, so I put it here.
1. keeper1

April 3  
  
Ten years. It's been ten years since our last Folk keeper died. We found his body mangled in the cellar. I was six, and remember the ciaos of that day clearly.  
  
I and my brother, Riker, were sitting at the table in the kitchen bothering our maid. Riker was begging her to fix him a chocolate pie and threatening her if she didn't. Rachael would just smile that sweet, fake smile at him and say no and that it would ruin his appetite for lunch. Riker is my older brother, he was about fourteen at the time and would always bother our Folk Keeper, Ben.  
  
I was always scared of Ben. One of his eyes didn't work and he would always look at me with his one working eye and smile. Now, I always thought that he wasn't smiling at me to be nice but that his was thinking up evil things to do to me. That's just the kind of look he had about him. But of course he never did anything to me.  
  
Anyway, as me and Riker, no, sorry, Riker and I. As we were sitting at the table I heard an awful scream. It was my mother. She had told us she was going to the cellar to check on Ben. Rachael dropped the knife she had been chopping carrots with and it clattered to the floor. She ran out of the kitchen, Riker following her, to the cellar (which is just down the hall). I climbed of the stool, as fast as I could, that I had been seated on. I can still remember how I felt, numb, and my stomach was in my throat. I was thinking that maybe the Folk had gotten her.  
  
Rachael and Riker had already reached the cellar door as I started down the hall. "My Lady! Are you all right?" I heard Rachael ask. "Mama, what's wrong?" I heard Riker ask. I finally reached the cellar door where Rachael and Riker stood as still as stone. I pushed passed them to see Mama. She was standing in the cellar looking at something on the floor.  
  
Mama had always told me to never come into the cellar or the Folk would get me, and I never had 'til then. In front of the Folk door was Ben, well all that I really could tell that was Ben is that there was the black coat that he always wore. It was twisted up around blood and chopped up body parts. Mama finally realized that I was standing by her and she looked down at me, the shock that was already on her face became ten times worse! "Rona, get out of here!" she screamed.  
  
I darted out of the cellar and pushed past Riker, whose eyes had gone all red. I ran all the way out of the Manor and kept running until I reached the little path that went carefully down the little cliff to the dock. I love it there on the dock, smelling the sea. Its where my Grandfather, Finian, used to keep his two boats. The Lady Rona, where I got my name from, and the Windcuffer.  
  
When I reached the dock I sat at the edge, hung my head over and threw up. I then laid back and thought about Ben's twisted body and thought about how much I hated the folk.  
  
I'm sitting in my room now writing this all down. We're getting a new Folk Keeper tomorrow and I have decided to keep a journal on him. We didn't get a new Folk Keeper after Ben because its as if the folk went into hibernation. But they've woken up again after ten years. Our chickens are starting to die, our cows are getting ill, and I still hate the folk.  
  
Riker got married and moved far away when he was twenty. He has never been the same since Ben was killed. I guess he has changed for the good though, because he's never picked on me or anyone else. Riker used to tell me scary stories about the folk. He said that Ben had told him what they look like but I would be too afraid to know. But that's okay; my imagination supplied plenty of images for me to be scared of.  
  
Riker also told me that our Grandmother had been a Folk Keeper. I never knew much about my Grandparents, Finian and Corinna, they died before I was born. My father was killed when I was three, by Hill hounds. They're of the other folk. They're usually in the shape of a dog. I don't really remember my dad either, but there are portraits of him and mama in the hall. 


	2. keeper2

April 4  
  
The folk keeper didn't arrive until this evening. He doesn't talk much at all. I thought it would be great to have someone here my age to talk to. Yes, the folk keeper is sixteen. And he has the most awful expression on his face. Rachael and mama told him about the folk being so wild, the folk keeper just turned up his pointy nose and said, "Don't worry, I'll be able to handle it." Oh, the awful folk keepers name is Eliot.  
  
I'm usually not so mean and pessimistic, but, he made a very bad first impression on me, and he has a stupid name. He didn't even notice that I was there. Now, people say I'm pretty, I don't think so, but I do get looks from boys at the market, and get whistled at occasionally. Maybe folk keepers see truth. Well, he's not a very handsome boy himself. He has oily looking black hair that he ties back. And his skin, well, its probably the only nice thing about him, he's very tan. His eyes, I didn't get to see much, because he was always squinting. Eliot is in the room across the hall from me. I wish Riker were here.  
  
April 5  
  
I woke up this morning from a bad dream. The folk were in it, and I bet that the stupid folk keeper sent those bad dreams on me. I got out of bed and looked in the mirror, above my vanity. It looked like I had been crying, which I probably had. I hate that every morning I have to unknot my hair. I don't like my hair color, its red or auburn but when I'm mad at it, it's red. I put on my blue dress today that clashes with my hair, but I didn't care, I was in a bad mood.  
  
I went down to the dinning room where we have our breakfast every morning; mama and the folk keeper were already there at the table. Mama was talking to the Eliot (the name reminds me of the word idiot). "Mrs. Nina," the Idiot was saying, '' I'll be fine. I have had plenty of experience with the Folk. I'm sure I know more about the Folk then your last folk keeper did."  
  
I walked in the dinning room and sat down quietly, beside mama. "Did you sleep well, dear?" Mama asked me. "No mam. I slept horrible.'' I felt the folk keeper looking at me then, "Did you sleep well, Eliot?" I asked carelessly. He nodded, got up from the table and left! He is so rude! I asked mama what was wrong with Eliot. Had he been viciously beaten by some sixteen year old girl and had vowed to himself to never speak to any of them again? She just smiled and said, "Dear, most folk keepers are very quiet. Plus, your mood probably scared him away." Then she left too.  
  
After my lonely breakfast I decided to look for that bag that Eliot had brought with him. Ben had a bag too, his "folk bag" that he had all his folk stuff in, and his folk record that he would write everything he knew about them in. So, I, well I, went and searched his room! There, I wrote it. I shouldn't be ashamed of it. I mean, I didn't steal anything. I didn't find his bag though. He probably takes it everywhere with him.  
  
I went to the library after I looked for his bag. I live in a huge Manor and we have a HUGE library. That's where I spend most of my time; I stayed there, even through lunch which I rarely eat, until Rachael came and got me for supper. I came into the dinning room, and there was Eliot, sitting there with his head bowed and eyes closed. I noticed that there was a big red burn on his neck. That's where he had been wearing a necklace of nails, that's to protect you from that folk. Looks like it didn't work with him. I came and sat across the table from him. He wouldn't look at me, so I sat there and stared at him. I watched as his face started slowly turning red. He was getting mad! It made me happy though.  
  
Eliot quickly looked up, with unsquinted eyes, they're so dark blue they're purple, and said, "Can I help you?" through clinched teeth. I smiled, "Yes, what do the folk look like?" Eliot relaxed a little, and sat there thinking. It looked hard for him to do. "Well," He started slowly in his deep voice, "They're mostly all mouth, they're three feet tall and your folk are the meanest I've ever met." He finished and looked at me with a blank expression. He has very broad shoulders. I then asked, "Is your neck okay?" "I'm fine." Our conversation was over. 


	3. keeper3

April 6  
  
This morning I got up got dressed and ran down to the cellar to find that wretched folk keeper. I had had some more awful dreams of the folk eating me slowly. Eliot wasn't in the cellar and he wasn't in his room. I ran to the kitchen and asked Rachael if she had seen him. She smiled at me slyly, for some weird reason that I didn't want to know, and said he wanted me to meet him at the dock. The dock? I grabbed an apple off the counter and ran most of the way to the dock. I had to slowly make my way on the path that goes down the cliff to the dock and was proud of myself that I didn't fall off onto the sharp rock below.  
  
Eliot was standing on the dock looking at the sea. "Good morning." he said as I came up behind him and took a bite of my apple. He was smiling I could tell. "Good morning." I said. Then Eliot turned around and there on his face was a smile! Wow, his teeth are white! I'm sure my mouth was hanging open because he started laughing! I was thinking what happened to you last night. "I knew you would be looking for me." Eliot said, still grinning. "I wasn't looking for you. I went to the kitchen to get breakfast and Rachael told me you wanted me to meet you here." "You wanted to talk to me or you wouldn't have gotten up so early." Eliot said STILL grinning. That was starting to aggravate me. We were standing far away from each other so I came closer and, stupid Eliot's grin got bigger and I thought about punching him. But it seems as if he read my mind and it vanished, clean off his face!  
  
"You're a witch." he commanded, all laughter gone from his voice. I was shocked! Again! He is so extremely moody! "W-what?!" I blubbered. "You're a witch or you're a folk keeper or you're very brave but I suspect the first guess was correct." Eliot said sharply. "What are you talking about!?" I said as I threw my hands in the air. Mama says if I couldn't use my hands I wouldn't be able to talk. "Your name is all over the cellar walls." Eliot said as if that explained that I was a witch and had put it there. "You are a very weird boy," I began angrily; "I've never been in the cellar in my entire life! And, I think that being in the dark for so long has ruined your eyesight!"  
  
Eliot stood there looking at me sternly, and then he reached into the Folk bag that was hanging over his shoulder, and pulled out a little leather bound book, his Folk Record. "This is what is written all over the walls, 'Poor Rona: take pity on her'. Tell me who etched that in the walls if that wasn't you, Rona?" I shrugged. How could I believe him? I was terrified of the Folk now and hated to even be near the cellar. How could I have done that? "Show me." I said bravely. "Alright." He said, then we took off up to the Manor and the cellar.  
  
We reached the cellar door. I was shaking so bad and I felt as if I might throw up. But I had to go in and see if he was telling the truth. Eliot lead the way into the cellar with a candle, I know one thing about the Folk. They hate the light. I made sure that Eliot kept the door open so I could escape quickly if the Folk decided that they wanted a snack.  
  
Eliot pulled me over to the wall, the stupid boy, and sure enough it was scraped into the wall in tiny letters, over and over,  
  
Poor Rona: take pity on her  
  
I touched the wall and felt the hard stone beneath my fingertips. It must have taken forever to scratch it into the stone. I took the candle from Eliot's hand and shown it over all the walls, over and over,....  
  
Poor Rona: take pity on her  
Poor Rona: take pity on her  
Poor Rona: take pity on her  
  
A sickening filling started rising up in my stomach. I had to get out of there. I looked at Eliot and said, "I did not do this." Tears started swelling in my eyes. I dropped the candle and ran up to my room and did not come down for lunch or supper. 


	4. keeper4

April 7  
  
I came out of my room this morning and crept downstairs to the kitchen. The cellar door was shut, and Eliot hadn't been in his room so he was probably in there. I went into the kitchen and sat down at the table, I noticed where I had seated myself on the stool I had sat on the day we found Ben, dead. Rachael was standing at the counter chopping, carrots!  
  
I jumped off the stool and ran down the hall to the cellar. I heard Rachael call behind me, "What's the matter, miss? Did you see a spider?" I got to the cellar door and pounded on it. "Eliot!" I yelled. There was a rumble that came from inside then I heard Eliot moan. My heart was beating so fast, I just knew something had happened to him! Then I heard Eliot say something, almost whispering something. I pressed my ear to the door, he was saying, "Its all right calm down, she was here yesterday." And then there was a rumble again, it shook the door that my face was pressed against. Then before I knew it the door was swung open quickly and I fell over into Eliot's arms!!! How my face turned red!  
  
"What the devil!" Eliot said and stood me back up onto my feet. His eye was swollen and black and his lip was cut. The Folk had hurt him. He stood there staring at me wildly. "What is it?" He asked sharply. "I thought the house was coming down the way you banged on that door!" "Sorry, I, thought something had happened to you. The rumbling, what was that? The Folk?" Eliot's expression faded away into a little grin. "Yes, it was the Folk. Now, don't you worry yourself about me, I'll be fine, the Folk won't hurt me." Then Eliot asked if I would go for a walk with him in the Graveyard, that's behind our house. He is very weird. The Graveyard?!  
  
But that's where we went. I stepped into the graveyard and the smell of moss and old mustiness came into my nose. I had not come here in a while. I walked in between the older graves of my Great, Great Grandmothers and Grandfathers some of my cousins and uncles, then I got to my grandmother, Corinna Stonewall, the Folk Keeper.  
  
Eliot was hunched over a grave near a shed in the graveyard, pulling some moss off of it. "My grandmother was a Folk Keeper." I said. Eliot lifted his head to look at me. "What? A Folk Keeper? I've never heard of a lady being a Folk Keeper." "That's what my brother always told me, Mama has even said so." I answered. Then I said after thinking a minute, "Maybe it was her that wrote my name, down there in the cellar." More to myself then to Eliot. "Yes, well that does explain it, but what did she pity you for?" Eliot said coming over to the grave I was standing next to.  
  
I shrugged. But I knew somehow that it hadn't been her that wrote that. "I really think it was probably this woman over here." Eliot said, pointing over next to the tool shed. I looked at him curiously, and then over to the shed. "There is no woman there, Eliot." "Of course there is." He answered me smiling. I went over to the shed and there she was, Rona, written on a grave. That's all that the grave had on it, Rona. "Then she must have been a Folk Keeper too, to go down into the cellar." "Or a witch." Eliot said.  
  
"You ready to leave?" Eliot asked starting to the open gate. I nodded and we left. We took a walk around the front grounds. "So, she, Rona, was sorry for herself. I wonder why. It made me feel sick when I saw the writing on the walls, that's why I ran out." Eliot was looking down at the ground as we walked, and bumping my elbow every once in a while but he didn't seem to notice. "I know, when I saw the look on your face I knew it couldn't have been you." "But you did think I could have been a witch?" I asked, grinning a little at the thought. Eliot looked up grinning too, a little. "Yes, why not?" I just shook my head and laughed.  
  
"How did you become a Folk Keeper? Did you just choose to be?" Eliot looked up into the sky and took a deep breath and didn't answer for a while. "You don't choose to be a Folk Keeper, the Folk choose you." "How?" I asked, looking at Eliot's unreadable expression. "My grandfather threw me into the cellar one night without a candle." Eliot answered simply. I was horrified! What kind of a grandparent would do that!? "Why?!" "Because he had his suspicions." "Well, what happened to you that night?" I looked at Eliot's face, and back at his neck just in time to see his hair stand straight up.  
  
Eliot cleared his throat and looked down at the ground. "Well," he started, his voice cracking, "the Folk are very evil, they, almost killed me." Eliot said painlessly and calmly. I felt my mouth drop and tears start to well up in my eyes. My Eliot, almost getting killed because his STUPID IDIOT grandfather had suspicions! "Rona." Eliot said, pulling me back into the world. I must have wondered off, I think I had been trying to imagine Eliot as a little boy and his stupid grandfather throwing him into the cellar and listening to his screams.... And there was Eliot still alive, there standing in front of me and everything was okay, but then I felt the tears that had escaped my eyes rushing down my cheeks! That was so embarrassing!!! "Why on earth are you crying?" Eliot asked, looking at me a grin coming to his lips, again.  
  
"Sorry." I said as I wiped them quickly away. My face, I'm sure looked beat red. "Yes, Its fine. Women are so extremely emotional." Eliot said as we walked back to the Manor in silence (I hated that) and Eliot did not say another word to me, ALL DAY.... 


	5. keeper5

April 10  
  
I have not seen Eliot for 2 whole days. I have looked and looked everywhere. I am worried and extremely bored. I have wandered to the graveyard and am sitting upon Rona's grave, writing. Mother and I are heading off to the Market in a while and I really wanted Eliot to come with us. I was reading back on April 7 and I saw that I had written "my Eliot". Why? Why did I write that? Sometimes I think I just start to write and my true feelings about things come out without me even noticing.  
  
April 11  
  
As I was sitting in the graveyard yesterday a Stupid BOY I know jumped out of a tree that was right above my head and scared the living daylights out of me!!! His name is Roger. Roger and I used to be tutored together. I was 12 maybe 13. We used to make all kinds of trouble together, and then one day he and his father just left. For no reason. Roger had no idea about him leaving he later wrote and told me. But we didn't keep in touch. He said he had come to see me on the 7th but Rachael told him that I was out in the graveyard. He had come out to the graveyard and had seen me and Eliot and had just decided not to bother us and come back later.  
  
Roger has grown up. I barely noticed who he was and after his wonderful landing out of the tree I had screamed and ran straight for the door to the fence, but Roger caught me and told me who he was and then apologized "immensely for the scare". And then Mama, Roger and I went to the Market. Anyway as I said Roger has grown up. He is at least 6 feet tall, very strong build, he has wonderful golden hair and his eyes are the deepest, richest brown you will ever see!!! I had a wonderful time with him at the Market; we talked about when we used to go swimming after our lessons in the sea, out by the dock. Then we would go terrorize Rachael by putting bugs and the like in her hair, then me and him would go out at night and fall asleep looking up into the sky for shooting stars. I can't wait to see him tomorrow! He told me he would come by! Yes! Oh, How I have missed him!!!!!!!  
  
April 12  
  
Eliot woke me up this morning with a huge smile across his face, and said, "GOOD MORNING, SUNSHINE!!!" I was wondering, again, what happened to you last night? "Where have you been?" I asked then yawned so big my jaw cracked. Eliot's smile disappeared quickly again and then he said, "The Folk have been acting strange ever since you came in there last week." I was thinking okay? "So?" Then Eliot untucked his shirt and lifted it up to show his stomach. There were these awful bruises starting at his rib cage and worked there way down all along his stomach and they even went down further to where his pants were covering. "Is that what they did?!" I asked pointing at his stomach. "Yes!" He said, and pulled his shirt back down. "Well, why? Are you saying that I upset them?" That was a stupid question. "Well, yes." Eliot answered calmly.  
  
Eliot and I went down to breakfast together and talked about why I would make the Folk so upset. We didn't come to any conclusion by the time Roger showed up around noon. Wow. Let me tell you everything that happened when the two boys met!  
  
Okay, the door bell rang and Rachael answered the door. Roger came in and kissed my mother on the cheek and then came straight over to me and lifted my hand and kissed it!!! Hahaha, you should have seen Eliot's expression then! It was odd, I think maybe Eliot likes me... his face turned an awful sun burnt red and he turned around and headed for the cellar. He didn't say a word to Roger!!! Well, then Roger asked mother if me and him could go for a walk down by the dock. She said yes but before I went with him I told him I needed to get something from the kitchen and to wait on me outside. Then I slipped off to the cellar instead and knocked on the door. No answer. "Eliot," I said, "please come out, or let me in." The door was slowly opened but just a hair. I pushed it open further and Eliot was standing there. It kind of scared me the way he stared at me. "Yes?'' He asked, his voice strained. "I was just coming to see if you would like to come for a walk with me to the dock?" His eyebrow shot up, almost off his face! "What about that boy that just came to see you?" he asked. "Oh, that's Roger, an old friend of mine, and I told him to come back another day." I lied. He bought it.  
  
I will write about the rest tomorrow. 


End file.
